imageBEIJING: China's Peng Shuai won the first WTA Tour title of her career Sunday, beating America's Alison Riske to secure the Tianjin Open.

Peng -- listed as 182nd in the world by the WTA -- beat the 56th-ranked American 7-6 (7-3), 6-2 in an hour and 45 minutes.

Riske's victory in the 2014 Tianjin Open remains her only WTA Tour win. This year's event has total prize money of $426,750.

At the semi-finals earlier in the day, she knocked out world number eight Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 in a gruelling encounter lasting two and a half hours with the Russian two-time Grand Slam champion and second seed.

Peng, 30, had defeated Montenegro's Danka Kovinic 3-6, 7-5, 6-3 to make it to the finals.

China has hosted an increasing number of WTA tournaments as it seeks more clout in the game.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2016

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